the Second Horseman (2006) Page 9

  Scanlon sat down and sipped his drink for a few moments. "I'm not going to defend my life to you, Brandon. And I'm not going to ask you to defend yours to me. We're who we are and we've done what we've done. Now what about the nukes?"

  Brandon sniffed at the drink in his hand, checking for the odor of poison. Not that he'd really know what it smelled like. He saw a movie once where Jodie Foster said it smelled like almonds.

  "I can't steal them, Richard. No one can."

  He didn't look particularly surprised. "On to plan B, then."

  "Does that involve my body being picked over by coyotes?"

  "That's plan C," Catherine said, giving his arm a strangely reassuring squeeze.

  Scanlon's laugh lacked even the slightest sinister edge. "So, Brandon. Tell me. What do you know about Ukrainian organized criminals?"

  "Complete psychopaths," he replied. "I stay as far away from those eastern bloc wackos as I can."

  "A pretty mercenary bunch, then?"

  "Slit their own mothers' throats for fifty --" Brandon fell silent for a moment and then took a satisfying swallow of the scotch in his hand. "You'll have to excuse me. Prison's made me a little slow. How much are they asking?"

  "No set price yet. But two hundred million ought to take them off the table."

  Chapter FOURTEEN

  Richard Scanlon's hand hovered over the phone for a few seconds before he finally picked it up. "Hello, Edwin."

  "I'm hearing disturbing things."

  Scanlon nodded silently. If there was one positive in all this, it confirmed that Hamdi did indeed have ears inside his organization. Not that he blamed the man. Their relationship was built more on a sturdy foundation of mutual respect than trust per se. Sometimes Scanlon felt as though they were two battle-weary fighters circling each other in the ring.

  "What things?"

  "That Brandon Vale is aware of your involvement in his escape. Do you deny that?"

  "No."

  The only response from Hamdi was a slightly elevated rate of breathing.

  "In fact, he and Catherine are in my break room right now."

  "And you were going to tell me this when?" His voice had transformed now, increasing in pitch and volume to the point that it sounded . . . dangerous.

  "I wanted to talk to him first. To see where he stood."

  "And just where is that, Richard? Where does this little thief stand?"

  "Honestly, I think it's better this way, Edwin. He isn't a good puppet. We'd have to deal with him constantly trying to cut the strings. We've already seen the prob--"

  "Don't rationalize, Richard! It doesn't become you. This was a serious error. Catherine was an unknown to him. Now he knows about you and that means everyone -- everything -- is jeopardized."

  "I disagree. The more information he has, the better he can help us -- if he decides to. And this has no effect at all on your level of risk. As you're well aware, no one but me knows anything about your involvement."

  "That's not entirely true, is it? I've been a strong supporter of your company in Washington. If you go down, I could be dragged down with you."

  "I don't see --"

  "We need to get rid of him, Richard. And we need to do it now."

  Hamdi was an extraordinarily intelligent and practical man, but one prone to occasional bursts of slightly self-conscious emotionalism. A cultural propensity toward martyrdom, Scanlon had once thought, and then admonished himself for it.

  "That would certainly be clean, but it would leave us back at square one, wouldn't it? We can't afford that, Edwin. You know we can't. The Ukrainians are no more than a few weeks from selling the first of those warheads and we don't have a backup plan."

  Again the only answer was the hiss of breathing.

  "Is there any chance Congress will loosen up and release the funds for my new contract?"

  "How many times do we have to go through this?" Hamdi snapped. "They're completely frozen until the commission report on the Mall of America attack comes out. And that won't be for at least two months."

  "Kind of ironic, isn't it?" Scanlon said, trying to move off the subject and inject a bit of calm into the conversation. "That a study on a terrorist act could potentially facilitate the most devastating terrorist attack in history? Maybe the most devastating attack of any kind in history. It seems like an easy decision to me, Edwin. We go with Brandon. Not because it's a good option, because it's the only option."

  Of course, Hamdi knew all this. His protests were motivated half by frustration and half to soften Scanlon up for the inevitable second part of this conversation.

  "I think we both understand now that this isn't a long-term accommodation, Richard. We get what we can out of him and then we get rid of him. There's too much at stake here to risk --"

  "I think you're being a little narrow-minded. Give him a chance to prove himself."

  "I did. He escaped and tracked you down over the course of forty-eight hours. What if he escapes again tomorrow? You think he won't use what he knows to make a deal? He doesn't owe you anything, Richard. Quite the opposite. Are you willing to risk the lives of millions of people on Brandon Vale's reliability?"

  Of course, what Hamdi was really talking about was his own life. More specifically, the possibility that the eminently unpredictable Brandon Vale might find a way to exercise power over it.

  Scanlon pulled out a low drawer in his desk and propped his feet on it. "Brandon may not have a degree from Harvard, but there's no denying he's brilliant at what he does. And as for reliability -- how many of your fair-haired government people would have kept their mouths shut and gone off to jail like Brandon did? Ivy Leaguers tend not to deal well with maximum-security prisons. They're also a little squeamish about breaking the law. They have lines they don't easily cross. Brandon has those lines, too, I suppose, but they're a little hazier."

  "Do you have a point?"

  "Yeah, actually, I do. Unorthodox problems sometimes require unorthodox solutions. Hell, even if we didn't need something stolen, Brandon makes my short list of potential employees."

  "In for a penny, in for a pound. Is that it, Richard?"

  "I was thinking more that the pot shouldn't call the kettle black."

  "Look," Hamdi started, enunciating carefully, "I know you were undecided on what to do with Vale when we were finished with him, and at the time I understood that. But I think it's a clear decision now. We have to be realistic. Whether he can help us or not, when we're finished with him, he has to go away. Agreed?"

  "Let's say I'll keep an open mind on the subject."

  "Fine," Hamdi said, though his tone suggested it wasn't. A moment later the line went dead.

  Scanlon replaced the phone's handset and took in a deep breath, holding it for a moment, and then letting it out slowly. One thing he had to say about Brandon Vale. He sure as hell was a lot of trouble.

  Chapter FIFTEEN

  Brandon dug a pizza box out of the refrigerator and tossed it like a Frisbee onto the table.

  "What are you doing?" Catherine said.

  "Dinner. What do you think I'm doing?"

  "Put the pizza back."

  "What are you talking about? It's pepperoni and sausage." He fished a six-pack of Coke from the back with one hand while lifting the foil on a piece of pie with the other. Apple. Wouldn't you know it? He was allergic to apples.

  Catherine picked up the box and pointed to the name JIM scrawled across it in Magic Marker. "It doesn't belong to you."

  He frowned and stared at her for a moment, watching the comprehension slowly flush into her face.

  Satisfied that she was once again clear about his shaky moral underpinnings, he checked the freezer. They were Ben and Jerry's people. Nice.

  "Finding everything all right?" Scanlon's voice.

  "No beer. Maybe we should hit Picasso for some foie gras?"

  "This is more intimate, don't you think?"

  "I think you're still a cheap bastard." He pointed at Catherine with
a finger covered in Cherry Garcia. "You know he used to make us put those little erasers on our pencils if we ran out of eraser before we ran out of lead."

  She nearly started laughing before she caught herself. "He still does."

  Brandon grimaced and sat at the table, popping the top on one of the Cokes and holding the open pizza box toward Catherine. "Give it a try. You know how they say that you appreciate stuff you earn more? Not true. Stolen stuff is always just a little bit better."

  She hesitated for a moment and then took a slice, biting off an end and chewing energetically. "It is pretty good," she said through a full mouth.

  "Christ," Scanlon said. "Just what I need. Two of you."

  Brandon started in on the ice cream again. "So, did you ever figure it out, Richard?"

  "Figure what out?" Catherine asked.

  reaching for a stolen Coke.

  "What Brandon was up to when he was working for me. At the time, I couldn't put my finger on exactly what he was after, so we had to cover every base. You wouldn't believe the amount of money and man-hours we spent changing security procedures, locks, passwords, computer systems -- all in case some of the people he worked with were still around."

  "How much?" Brandon asked.

  "Millions."

  "Nice. I hope you looked like a compete fuckup."

  "Oh, believe me, I did. Honestly, it's the reason I left and started this company. My credibility was never coming back."

  They fell silent again and Catherine drummed impatiently on the table. "Okay, enough of this. Tell me. How were you going to rip off the casinos?"

  "If I told you, I'd have to kill you," Brandon said, smiling broadly. "Besides, it'd be more interesting to see how Richard did."

  Scanlon sat at the table but seemed reluctant to eat. "You weren't interested in the casinos at all."

  "What do you mean?" Catherine said, motioning for Brandon to share the carton of ice cream in his hand.

  "Have you ever considered where Las Vegas's cash goes?"

  "Not really"

  "Of course not. Why would you? But think about it now. The cash comes flooding in here every day. The casinos and local businesses take it in -- literally tons of it. If they didn't get rid of it, it would just pile up in the streets."

  Brandon quietly clapped his hands, genuinely impressed.

  "Okay," Catherine said. "Sure."

  "So how do you figure they do that?" Brandon interjected. "Get rid of it, I mean."

  "I don't know. A transport plane? Maybe a motorcade of armored cars?"

  Brandon grinned. "I used to go to this bar. There was a big bathroom on the first floor. You know, urinals, stalls. Whole thing was covered in graffiti. Upstairs, there was another bathroom. It was small and just looked like something that would be in your parents' house. After ten years, not a single word of graffiti."

  She thought about that for a moment and then just shrugged.

  "Don't you get it? Very few people in the world truly have the ability to think outside the box. You write graffiti in a public bathroom, but not in your mom's. The whole transport system is based on the theory that no one ever thinks outside that box."

  "Except you," Scanlon interjected.

  "Yeah. I wrote 'Fuck' really big on the wall of that bathroom right over a vase of fake flowers. Two weeks later, it was covered. Like you always said, Richard, it's all about leadership."

  Catherine rolled her eyes and got up to look for a spoon.

  "Years ago, when I worked for the FBI here," Scanlon started, "I helped set up a simple transfer based on the hide-in-plain-sight principle. If we'd created something more obvious and elaborate -- the armored motorcade you mentioned -- it would have attracted the wrong element." He thumbed toward Brandon. "And a plane doesn't solve your problem -- you've still got to drive to it, load it, and then do the same thing on the other end."

  "Exactly," Brandon said. "It's kind of an elegant setup, if you think about it. They keep it quiet and ninety-nine percent of the people in the world never give the flow of cash out of Vegas a moment's thought. The other one percent either aren't criminals or just assume there's some massively secure setup involving the army or something."

  "So how does it get moved?"

  Scanlon nodded toward Brandon. "Now let's see how you did."

  "By regular old vans and sometimes semis, taking random routes to the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco, right?"

  It was Scanlon's turn to clap.

  "So the question I was trying to answer working for Richard was what the schedule was -- I wanted to hit the semi, not the individual vans, obviously. And I needed to know the level of protection -- air cover, number of guards, type of guards. That kind of stuff."

  "Did you ever get that information?" Catherine asked.

  "Not much of it. You can imagine that it's kind of hard to draw anyone into that conversation without being obvious. But I was piecing it together and meeting the people who could get me there." He turned toward Scanlon. "One thing I never figured out and it kind of haunts me: How much is in that semi?"

  Scanlon didn't answer, a hint of uncertainty suddenly appearing in his eyes.

  "Come on, Richard. It's a little late to get squeamish now."

  "Yeah, I guess it is. Somewhere between a hundred and seventy-five and two hundred million."

  Brandon let out a low whistle. "Oh, man. That's beautiful. Is your information still good?"

  He nodded. "When I finally figured out what you were after, I went to the security firm that oversees the transport and told them. They juggled a bunch of the procedures in case you'd figured any of them out."

  "And were you one of the jugglers?"

  "A paid consultant. I know everything."

  "Irony," Brandon said, slowly shaking his head. "I love that."

  "We've been through this four times already."

  Scanlon was pacing back and forth across the room, his back aching from hours of sitting. He was tired enough to make it nearly impossible to think coherently, while Brandon seemed to be sucking energy directly from the air. The sad truth was that he was getting too old for all this. It was coming time for Brandon's generation to take responsibility for the world.

  "Yeah, but I'm not completely clear on the --"

  "You've got plenty to think about," Scanlon said. "We can deal with the minutiae tomorrow."

  Catherine was sitting on the floor, dozing amid a collection of empty paper plates and wadded-up tinfoil.

  "You just need a little caffeine," Brandon said, shaking the soda cans on the table, searching for one that hadn't been drained.

  "What I need is to go home."

  Catherine woke suddenly, tossing the hair out of her face. "Home?" she said groggily.

  Brandon found something left in one of the cans, but instead of offering it to Scanlon, he drained it, stood, and wandered out of the room. He was deep enough in thought that he rammed the doorjamb with his shoulder and didn't seem to notice.

  "I'm sorry I fell asleep," Catherine said, struggling to her feet. "But when he started into exactly how trailers are hooked to semis for the tenth time, it was like someone hit me over the head with a brick."

  "It seems like overkill," Scanlon agreed. "But there's no point in second-guessing him on this kind of thing."

  "You look horrible," she said, walking up and smoothing the shirt on his shoulders. "Are you sleeping?"

  "Are you?"

  She ignored the question and put a hand on his forehead. "You're not getting sick are you?"

  "I'm fine," he said, gently taking her hand and putting a small piece of paper in it.

  "What's this?"

  He leaned in close to her ear. "An e-mail address and passwords. Memorize them and destroy the paper."

  "What --"

  "If you should ever run into serious problems and can't contact me, you'll need to get into that account."

  He looked into her worried face and immediately felt a pang of guilt for being the cause
of it. What choice did he have, though? There was no telling what Hamdi had planned for Brandon, and he didn't want to see her get caught between those two.

  "It's okay," he said. "I can't imagine you'll ever need it. But you hope for the best and plan for the worst, right?"

  Chapter SIXTEEN

  Despite its being quite simple, Jamal Yusef read the e-mail a third time, closed it, and decrypted it again. The result was always the same.

  Finally, knowing that the computer was draining the ancient car batteries providing power, he shut it down. The blood was pounding loudly in his ears, and when he tried to stand, his legs seemed incapable of supporting him.

  Edwin Hamdi had been so smooth and logical during their courtship. He'd made perfect sense, gracefully countering every argument Yusef had put to him with talk of patriotism and the greater good. But none of this was theoretical anymore. Hamdi hadn't watched those people at the theater die. He hadn't seen them bleed, smelled them burning. With hands so slippery with blood, it was becoming increasingly difficult to hold on to that logic.

  Yusef hesitated before opening the tent flap. He'd been barricaded inside since his return from Jerusalem -- something that had likely not gone unnoticed by his men. What had they read into his self-imposed isolation?

  When he finally stepped out into the blinding sun his legs had steadied, but his hands still shook. They always did now.

  Ramez was drilling the men, trying to get them into military formation and to march them in a straight line. Why, Yusef wasn't sure. Perhaps it appealed to the younger man's overdeveloped sense of order, though it generated nothing but frustration for everyone else involved. There was something about Arab culture that didn't mesh with military discipline. These were people ruled by passion.

  Yusef grabbed a rifle leaning against a rock and fired it in the air, feeling a sickly burst of adrenaline as the recoil wrenched his arm. The men ducked involuntarily and then turned, looking both confused by his uncharacteristic outburst and relieved to be done with Ramez's endless drill.

  It occurred to Yusef that he could kill them all right now. They were unarmed, lined up only twenty feet away. His clip was still nearly full. Eleven fanatical terrorists --